Taiwan’s Paiwan tribe has two forms of architecture that are roughly divided by the Shiwen River — slate house and house with thatch roof. The Tjuvecekadan settlement is separated by a mountain from the Shiwen River, and its residential buildings follow the architectural style of Paumaumaq, its parent Paiwan group living in the north. Therefore, this article uses Tjuvecekadan as representative settlement to illustrate the characteristics of Paiwan slate constructions.

2-1. Building materials

2-1-1. Stone

It is a difficult task to obtain slate as a building material because the quarry is situated at the upstream branch streams of the Chijia River below the slate construction settlement, and it takes about 2 hours for one to reach there by foot. Each time one touches the black plate of slate, the imagry of the Paiwan ancestors working hard to cut giant rocks and carry the slate one by one from the valley will come to one’s mind, making one admire ancestral perseverance and fortitude with the utmost sincerity and strengthening the faith of the Paiwan tribesmen in their slate construction culture. 

Slate materials are obtained locally, and it requires expert knowledge to choose the right stones. Generally speaking, stone materials are divided according to their hardness. Those with hard texture and are not easy to crack are called “oqalai (hard rock),” which are dark with heavier weight, have strong reflective properties, offer a clear sound when  struck, and have fine texture. They are suitable for making ancestral spirits pillars, roof slates, beds, hall floors, and compartment boards of the front wall.

On the other hand, those that are more fragile with lighter color and weight, offer a dull sound when struck, and peel with debris when touched are called “vavaian (soft rock).” Because of its fragile texture, vavaian is usually paved in less-used areas in the house, such as kitchen stoves, base stone walls, and roof slate edges. They can also be used to pave village roads. Overall, the usage of slates in Tjuvecekadan was  given full play to creative thinking and made the best use of every material.

2-1-2. Timber

It also requires expert knowledge to select the appropriate timber. As roof beams play a key role in supporting roof slates, the timber has to be selected very carefully. Bishop wood (Bischofia javanica), stout camphor tree (Cinnamomum kanehirae), Japanese zelkova (Zelkova serrata), Formosan michelia (Magnolia kachirachirai), Taiwan cypress (Chamaecyparis formosensis) and Nan (Phoebe zhennan) were the most common building materials available across Taiwan before the Forestry Bureau began logging and afforestation in 1979. However, most the original forests  have been cut down since afforestation operations began. Therefore, most of the remaining roof beams in Tjuvecekadan are centuries-old and well-preserved from earlier times.

To build a slate house at that time required not only collecting, sorting, and extracting stone materials but also searching, logging, transporting, cutting, and lifting the timber. Under the circumstances of limited resources and poor environment, the Paiwan ancestors used their hands and wisdom to tow back the timber piece by piece. Of course, such teamwork among villagers symbolized the solidarity of the Paiwan tribe.

2-2. Structural analysis

2-2-1. Overall description

The main support system of the slate house structure uses stone walls to bear the bulk of weight, with pillars being its sub-system of support. The front wall (tseleb in the Paiwan language) is erected with slates and the 60-90 cm wide side walls (ubu) are stacked with shale slates. The roof (qaliu) is thatched with slates in double-slope form, with a long slope facing the front yard and a shorter back slope towards the mountain. The roof truss consists of eaves truss (sasuayan), girder (siyangan), rafter plate (vali), and slate (qatsilai).

The double-slope hard roof form has a front-slope roof longer than the back-slope roof, with the ratio being 3:2. Wooden rafter plates are used as the base of the roof, which is covered by slates in the large-to-small and bottom-up order without using any adhesive or holder to fix them in place. The ridge of a roof is held down by bamboo stripes and white stones from the Han River because  ridge slates are smaller and can be blown down or moved easily by wind and rain. White creek stones are used because they give the house a white and beautiful appearance against the backdrop of black slates. Moreover, during the days of constant  warfare between traditional tribes, the white stones looked like skulls aligned on the roof  to the eyes of faraway enemies and helped to scare them away. 

2-2-2. Load-bearing system

Stone walls on both sides of the house are the main load-bearing structure, and the central ridge beam is supported by the ancestral spirits pillar. Each house has seven crossbeams. The outdoor front eave serves to support the house and prevent it from leaning forward. During the period of Japanese rule, the triangular wood truss (tjakela) was introduced to assist the load-bearing capability of the side walls.

2-2-3. Drainage system

If there are no houses next to the side walls, the side walls have to be paved with slates parallel to the roof slope. The main purpose of such design was to let the rain flow down the slates, which prevented water from entering the house on a rainy day and reduced the danger of a side wall collapse from water damage. 

2-2-4. Construction method

The slate house is the traditional architectural style of the Paiwan tribe. The building materials used are mainly shale and timber. The Paiwan ancestors lived a hard life and worked diligently to build houses with limited resources and develop their settlement. To receive permission from the chieftain and obtain a patch of land to build a house, each tribesman had to bow and scrape in front of the chieftain with profound respect and humility. After obtaining a piece of land, the tribesman had to wait until he was spared from farming duties to excavate and sort out the land, remove stones, and backhoe the dirt by exchanging labor with other tribesmen or working alone slowly.

2-3. Space utilization

2-3-1. Outdoor space

Each house in Tjuvecekadan had a front yard (katsasavan) of a different size for family members or guests to rest. Even today, long-term residents of the tribe can be seen sitting on slate chairs and chatting in the front yard. Since the houses were built on the mountain, sometimes one hillside is at the end of a house’s front yard while below it was the roof of another house. This made it easy for people to interact with others and establish close relationships.

In Tjuvecekadan, some larger houses also have terraces in their front yards. The terraces are especially wide in the house of the tribal chief, and it is where the chief gives orders and villagers gather for assembly. It is also where the annual harvest festival and the ancestral spirits festival (maleveq, as it is known in the Paiwan language, is also called the five-year festival) are held.

Stilt barns (qubao) are built on the terrace in traditional slate houses to store harvested products such as millet and taro. Ancestral spirits houses, which are structured like slate houses, are ancillary facilities only permitted to those of tribal chief rank. According to legend, an ancestral spirits house is the first place dug by the chief when he starts establishing a new tribal settlement. This spot is called “tsinektsekan,” meaning “the place to stick spears and arrows.” Both the harvest festival and ancestral spirits festival begin their rituals from the ancestral spirits house.

Life in the traditional village was simple and monotonous. When someone found a beehive in the wild, he or she usually removed the bees and brought the hive back to share with other tribespeople. When a complete and well-formed beehive was found, the tree trunk would be cut down and brought back together with the beehive. The trunk would then  be put under an eave so that the bees can continue living in their original beehive.

Under the eaves of the tjavetseqat slate house in Tjuvecekadan, intact beehives inside hollow tree trunks can still be seen today.  The sight seems to reflect the dilapidated scene of the settlement, in which most people have moved out, leaving only empty houses behind. 

2-3-2. Indoor space

The plane of the main house is usually rectangular, with a long horizontal surface and a short depth. The door of the main house is usually at the left or right side of the front wall. The indoor space is divided into anteroom (tara), bedroom (qaqarngan), living room (kasintan), storage space (babunemangan), and a toilet area that also serves as pig sty (qatsan).

The bedroom (qaqarngan) and anteroom (tara) are on the right or left side of the house, and the living room (kasintan) is in the middle of the house after the hallway. The space near the side wall is used as kitchen and dining room (kakesan or qavuqavuwan), and there are utensils shelves and a stove. The area from living room to kitchen is the focal point of family life, emphasizing the intimacy and sense of belonging when family members live together.

The Paiwan tribe is a large aboriginal tribe in southern Taiwan. Japanese anthropologist Kanori Ino gave them a Japanese name first, and Ryuzo Torii wrote it as Paiwan. Shitsu Suzuki said: “according to legend, Paiwan is the sacred place where their ancestors originated and it is a swell on Dawu Mountain, and today’s Paiwan tribe has spread from there. Therefore, the tribe was named after their place of origin.”

Regarding the history of Paiwan migration, Japanese scholars believed that the tribe first lived in the Paiwan (Ailiao River) valley at the foot of the mountain. With the area as their base,  the Paiwan people gradually migrated westward, southward, and eastward, eventually reaching Goloan (Eluanbi), the southernmost cape of Taiwan. Dutch documents from the mid-17th century clearly stated that major Paiwan tribes had settled in their current territories around that time. They were also the only tribes that settled in that area. 

Case study: Kuskus settlement site

The Kuskus village was the hub of transportation, education, administration, and business in Mudan Township during the period of Japanese rule. To promote the establishment of cultural and historical data, the Mudan Township Office started to digitize each village’s historical and map data in 2003. Senior tribesmen in Kuskus were asked to narrate the migration process and provide locations. According to their records, the tribe originated from “saqacenqalj” more than 500 years ago.

“Saqacenqalj” refers to the tool that the Paiwan people used to chisel slates. The settlement site is located at a gentle slope in Mudan Township. The gentle slope contains 10 terraces in the east-west direction, and the slated are aligned according to the terrain and parallel to the terrace.

Structure of slate constructions in Saqacenqalj

The settlement’s houses were built by following the slope’s direction, with their backs towards the mountains and facing the ocean in the front. The houses were arranged in parallel with the terraces, and houses on each terrace were also positioned in parallel with the slope, backed by mountains and facing the ocean. The structures of these early slate houses were generally similar — each consisted of a front yard, terrace, drainage ditch, and a small structure before the  terrace. In the front yard of most houses here, there is a terrace piled up by slates. But in contemporary Paiwan society, only the tribal chief’s house has a terrace, which is called a “command post” and used for assemblies, festivals, and rituals. However, 64% of the houses on this site have a frontyard terrace, so they are called “terrace” instead of “command post.” 

Building technology in Saqacenqalj

Scholars have found that the slates used in this site were not taken directly from the riverbed but were processed manually. They were cut neatly with smooth sections, showing  excellent masonry skills. The wall slates, although varied in size and thickness, have a uniform appearance. Every wall was constructed with carefully piled slates, and the gaps between large slates were filled with smaller ones to strength structural support. 

Criterion II

Both the Paiwan and Rukai Settlements of Slate Constructions have fully preserved their history and culture, attracting anthropologists and architects to conduct research. Cultural resources in the area, such as settlement landscape and natural scenery on the mountain, are naturally blended together. The slate settlements have obvious spatial arrangements, offering well-preserved records of the traditional life of Paiwan and Rukai tribes, as well as their houses, front yards, quarries, water sources, and traditional domains. Therefore, these sites meet the second selection criterion for inclusion on the list of World Heritage Sites.

Criterion V

Paiwan and Rukai tribes relocated their villages to the plains during the period of Japanese rule. Their settlements in mountainous areas were inaccessible due to lack of transportation and they could not be connected to an electricity grid. At the present, tribal members only occasionally use the original slate houses for work or recreation. The Paiwan and Rukai Settlements of Slate Constructions are in a fragile state after long-term damage by climate conditions and the passage of time, meeting the fifth selection criterion for inclusion.